News from a Changing Planet -- This Week on Earth #5

Reducing pollution helped save Himalayan glaciers, New York City gets closer to congestion pricing, people are pushing the Earth off kilter, and it was the mushrooms the whole time...plus more!

Nilkanth Peak in the Himalayas. Credit Pawan Modi via Yale Environment 360

PRETTY CHILL: Reductions in particulate pollution during COVID helped Himalayan glaciers stop melting. (Yale Environment 360)

During the COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020, particulate pollution dropped so significantly in India that the decline helped avert the melting of about 27 million metric tons of ice and snow from Himalayan glaciers, compared to 2019 levels, according to a new study in PNAS Nexus.

More than a billion people in South Asia depend on the slow-melting of snow and ice in the Himalayas for freshwater for drinking, but particulate pollution from internal combustion engines of cars, trucks, coal-fired power plants that settles on the bright white glaciers causing them to absorb more solar energy, accelerating the melting process.

Time for (getting rid of) some traffic problems etc etc. Credit Brittainy Newman for The New York Times

…THAT COULD STOP TRAFFIC: New York City’s long-awaited congestion pricing plan is inching closer to becoming reality. (New York Times)